ALL vs EVERY

ALL and EVERY have similar meanings but are used in different structures.

ALL + PLURAL NOUN	EVERY + SINGULAR NOUN
ex. All children should go to school.	ex. Every child should go to school.
All vegetables are healthy.	Every vegetable is healthy.

ALL can be used before a determiner (ex. the, this/that, these/those, my...)

ex. All the items in the store were on sale!

I sent an email to all my friends.

ALL can be used with uncountable nouns.

ex. I like all music.

In the future I hope that all poverty is gone!

*Often if the noun is uncountable, we use the article “the” after ALL.

ex. He finished all (of) the work.
He reviewed all (of) the documents.

all his work.png

ALL is used to describe the duration of an activity, meaning the complete amount.

For example, let’s look at the difference between the following two sentences:

1. She has been at work ALL day.
Meaning: from the beginning of the day until the end of the day / from morning until night

2. She worked EVERY day this week.

Meaning: Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday

And another example:

1. I can’t believe he ate ALL the cake.

Meaning: There is one cake. He ate the whole thing!

2. I can’t believe he ate EVERY cake.

Meaning: There are many cakes. He ate every cake.